Should I use Paypal buttons or a full e-commerce solution? The answer to this question really boils down to the budget and scale of your business.

If you are a small business looking to sell a small amount of inventory online, Paypal buttons are an affordable place to start. Some nice features Paypal’s buttons provide are:

• No need to pay a monthly fee for a payment gateway to accept credit cards. Instead,  Paypal  takes 2.9% and $0.30 per transtaction.
• Buttons can be embeded into just about any type of website. You do not need a sophisticated e-commerce platform to start collecting funds online, just the ability to copy and paste the button code into the desired location on your website.

That said, if you want to take your online sales to the next level upgrading to a true e-commerce platform is the way to go. Not only will it give you a professional appearance, it opens a whole new set of tools to help you sell more. Here are some reasons to “make the leap” into e-commerce:

• Ease to update: Every time you want to add a new product with Paypal you will need to generate/embed a new button on your site. While not difficult, this can be very time consuming for you or your web developer. In contrast, with an e-commerce site creating new products can easily be done from within the same interface and product information ( such as price, image, description, shipping, etc…) is automatically generated on the front end of your store.
• Ideal Shopping Cart Experience: E-commerce platforms  blow paypal buttons out of the water when it comes to enhancing the users experience. With a true e-commerce platform the customer can create their own account, save items to their basket, view past orders, write reviews, sign up for newsletters, use coupon codes,  and create address books. This makes your site easier for them to use and adds credibility to your business.
• Better Order Management: With an e-commerce platform you will have an admin interface that allows you to easily track/fill incoming orders, look up customers information, and print invoices or packing slips. Many interfaces also keep your customer informed on their order status via email as you move an invoice from processing to shipped.
• Multiple shipping options: E-commerce solutions allow you to set up multiple shipping options with major providers such as FedEx, USPS, USP, and more for real-time rates. In contrast paypal buttons only offers flat rate or tiered shipping options, making it more difficult to provide accurate shipping rates.
• Multiple payment options: Although paypal does allow users to pay with a credit card instead of creating an account with them, many users are not familiar with this option and may be turned away if they do not have a personal paypal account. With a true e-commerce solution you can  set up multiple payment options, including paypal, authorize.net, check/money order, or even in store pickup.

In short, paypal is an affordable way to quickly get your products online and allow visitors to purchase them. However, it is in no way a substitute for a full e-commerce solution, which should be the end goal of any growing business wanting to sell large quantities of goods online.